Record file — Island Senior Resources and Senior Thrift employees gather at a make-shift office in the thrift shop’s parking lot in July. The store has been closed since a fire damaged the building, but it will reopen on Black Friday.

Senior Thrift reopens after Thanksgiving

Forced to close after sustaining damage from a fire, Senior Thrift is reopening in time for the busiest shopping day of the year.

Officials from Island Senior Resources, the organization that oversees the thrift store, announced on Thursday it will reopen on Black Friday.

The store has been closed since July 23.

Island Senior Resources staff initially estimated the closure would take only a “couple weeks,” but the smoke damage was more extensive than initially thought. Since then, they’ve targeted a Black Friday reopening date, which they say was difficult to meet.

“We looked at it a while back and we set a target date of the day after Thanksgiving,” Skye Dunn, Island Senior Resources communications manager, said. “We’ve been working hard with all the contractors and everybody involved, we cut it really close but we’re hitting the date we set.

“As a funding source for a nonprofit, being able to be open on the biggest shopping day of the year is a huge burden off of us.”

The fire that damaged the building occurred in the attic furnace in the middle of the night. The blaze significantly damaged the building’s entire electrical system. Although it didn’t damage the outer structure, the inside structure and its contents sustained significant smoke damage.

Senior Thrift lost all of its inventory. Luckily, Island Senior Resources is well-insured and was reimbursed for its losses.

However, the store will be fully-stocked in time for the holiday shopping rush.

“Thanks to the generosity of island residents, the store is now filled to capacity with high quality merchandise, both new and used,” Robin Bush, outreach manager, said. “Since the fire, Island Senior Resources received assistance from many members of the local and regional community through donations of goods.”

Senior Thrift is one of the primary sources of funding for Island Senior Resources; it rakes in the most money outside of federal and state funding. According to organization officials, the funds go toward programs that aid seniors, such as Meals on Wheels, transportation to Seattle for medical consultations and programming at the senior center in Bayview.

Island Senior Resources has used the closure as a chance to make a few additions to the thrift store. The store will have an expanded retail space, including a new “boutique area” containing goods on the higher end of the scale.

The over 14,000-square-foot storefront is repurposing some of the upstairs space as a shopping area, as it previously housed Island Senior Resource’s administration and finance office.

Kyle Jensen / The Record — The thrift store’s truck is parked in the lot prior to the store opening next week. The thrift store is fully stocked with new items after the store lost all its inventory.